Christopher Bentley
Institutional Critique: Mamma Haïdara Commemorative Library – Timbuktu, Mali
Libraries, Archives & Databases: Mid-Semester Project
Spring 2011 – Dr. Shannon Mattern
The fabled city of Timbuktu has been of particular importance to Islamic
scholarship and colonial myth and history alike. The remote geography of the city –
situated north of the Niger River at the southern fringe of the Sahara desert in
present-day Mali – limited the early presence of Western colonization and
established the city as an important trade hub for the historically transient North
African peoples. A perilous journey awaited any Western explorer who wished to
travel to Timbuktu during the colonial era and perhaps for this very reason the city
became synonymous with seclusion and remoteness. Myths were built around the
city’s reputation in the Western world, which often influenced the written
descriptions of the city by explorers1. Consequently the travelogues and early
ethnographies of the area were elaborate conglomerations of ethnocentric
observation, inductive social commentary, and pre-fabricated mythology. This may
have been an attempt to salvage the sentiments belonging to an earlier era of
exploration – one of adventure, romance and mystery.
Perhaps contrary to the perspective of Western colonial history regarding
Timbuktu are the documents stored by the Mamma Haïdara Commemorative
Library and the Library of Cheick Zayni Baye of Boujbeh (both located in Timbuktu)
attesting to the rich Islamic and scholarly history of the region. Prior to their
1
This is a practice that is reflected in many written accounts of the Other by early Western
anthropologists in the colonial era. I am reminded of a processual (structural) archaeologist’s
warning: beware of approaching a site with your mind fixed on what you want to find, because
whether it actually exists or not, you’ll probably find it.
incorporation into the institutional library environment, the texts – including
treatises on the Qur'an, hadith, religion, mathematics, astronomy, prosody,
government and history2 - were housed in the mud and wood scaffold mosques or at
the homes of the descendents of traditional protectors of the texts. The survival of
the manuscripts is in part due to the arid climate of the desert and the “hidden”
nature of the city. However, this caché quality belonging to the manuscripts and
their history is a Western created illusion. Many Muslims in Mali have always
known about the manuscripts’ existence and Timbuktu’s status as an Islamic center
for study.
The content of the manuscripts, and their importance as artifacts and
historical knowledge, is undeniably valuable in the construction of this region’s
historical identity. Before the manuscripts were made known to Western scholars it
was generally assumed that African history was largely based on oral tradition, but
the existence of the manuscripts reveal a literary scholarship stretching back
centuries (at least in north-western Africa). However, at times this Western
revelation seems to be on the verge of conjuring up familiar sentiments of
Timbuktu’s colonial-based, ethnocentric, Western mythology. As the Chicago
Tribune reported in 1999, “over 400 manuscripts have been found by Professor
John Hunwick (of Northwestern) from around Africa since 1964 but the most recent
find was in Mali, where the descendants of the African historian Mahmud al-Kati
have been keeping them since his death in 1592”3.
2
The Robert Goldwater Online Library Resource. May 19, 2009.
http://goldwaterlibrary.typepad.com/rgl/conservation/
3 Chicago Tribune, Apr 9, 2001.
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Once the prospect of gold and infamy, now Timbuktu yields ancient, “hidden”
Islamic artifacts waiting to be “discovered” by Western scholars. The story is
familiar and echoes the adventurous spirit of Western explorers in Africa from
Drake to Livingstone (This is mentioned not to cast judgment or to critique scholarly
exploration or competition, but as an observation of how saturated rhetoric
surrounding Africa has become due to colonial history and post-colonial
development industry practices). The “finding” of the Timbuktu Islamic manuscripts
in 1999 opened new doors – both literally and figuratively – for scholarship in the
remote city and for new environments surrounding the ancient texts. Soon after the
knowledge of the manuscripts was made known to scholars throughout the world
an international committee of historians, anthropologists, preservationists and
Islamic scholars was formed to discuss the importance and the future of the
artifacts. Libraries were constructed in Timbuktu to “properly” store the documents
and increase their accessibility to local and visiting scholars and tourists.
Meanwhile the manuscripts traveled the globe as an exhibition making stops at the
Library of Congress and the Goldwater Library of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
among other notable institutions until returning to the newly constructed library
space. I traveled to Timbuktu in April of 2009 to see the manuscripts at the Mamma
Haïdara Commemorative Library while serving a two-year volunteer position with
the Peace Corps in central Mali.
*
The road to Timbuktu is a rutted dirt and shifting aeolian sand ribbon
weaving through ancient sand dunes stabilized by sparse vegetation in the
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northernmost section of the Sahel – a region of arid, scrub-brush stretching from
Senegal in the west to Sudan in the east. Tourists and locals begin their journey
from Douentza, a truck-stop town on the main highway that cuts through Mali, and
continue by bus or 4x4 north to Timbuktu. The trip is dusty and bone rattling but
generally not that uncommon for travel off the main roads in Mali. The Niger River
appears on the horizon after a five hour drive at which point a ferry crossing is
required to reach the northern bank, the southern boundary of the Sahara and the
southern city limit of Timbuktu.
As a kid growing up in rural Utah I always dreamed of traveling to the Sahara
and Timbuktu to ride a camel through the desert. Like many Americans, my idea of
the fabled city was largely a hyper-romanticized conglomeration of explorer’s tales
and epic movies like Lawrence of Arabia and Indiana Jones (neither of which I realize
ever traveled to Timbuktu). After living in Mali for nearly two years and hearing
stories about the city, seeing a few pictures taken by European ex-pats and fellow
volunteers, I constructed a better understanding what to expect. However, I was still
surprised to find the city with comparable infrastructure – paved roads, electricity
and even a streetlight or two – to some of Mali’s more developed cities.
Most of Timbuktu’s Western visitors, like myself, opt to make the journey
harder than necessary by taking the overland route by 4x4 and/or bus (the place is
visited because it is notoriously hard to get to right?). Timbuktu is in fact easier to
reach by riverboat– large steamers with sleeping chambers and viewing decks – in
the rainy season, or by plane. Flights from Paris and Marseilles arrive daily in
Timbuktu during the peak tourist season between November and March via Point-
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Afrique Airlines. Even though it might be easier to reach than in the days of French
explorer René Caillié, the first Westerner to visit and return alive from Timbuktu,
the city is still a fascinating combination of northern, Berber influenced Africa and
sub-Saharan Africa, composed of mainly Bambara, Mande, Fulani and Songhay
cultures.
After visiting the madrassa and the grand mosque in the center of the city –
centuries old structures incorporating sub-Saharan and Moroccan-style architecture
– I found the Mamma Haïdara Library unassuming. The concrete and cinder block
concession (a compound consisting of a large courtyard surrounded by structures) I
immediately recognized as the ubiquitous architecture associated with government
administration offices and large international NGO hubs, in other words an
institution with money. The entrance to the manuscript library is tucked in a corner
building under a covered walkway. Two Malian men sat near the door preparing tea
over open coals in a wire basket. I was greeted warmly and after exchanging a few
jokes was asked to pay a fee to see the manuscripts. The fee to enter the library was
negotiable – like most things in Mali – but a requested donation of 1500 CFA, or
about $3, was suggested. Inside the heavy metal door is a modest single room lined
with the wooden shelves where most of the manuscripts are held. In the middle of
the room is a waist-high wood and glass display table with a selection of Islamic
manuscripts accompanied by handwritten labels in French and Arabic. Apart from
the manuscripts in the display case there is little to examine. The texts in the
shelves lining the room are barely visible behind the glass and wire-mesh doors that
remain closed and locked. I was free to take a few pictures – at no extra cost – and
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after a few minutes I asked if I could see a manuscript from the shelf. I was
surprised when the librarian nodded, removed a manuscript from the shelf and
from its protective box and held it out for me to take. The age of the manuscript, its
history and fragile state prevented me from taking it from his hands. He finally
smiled and placed the manuscript on the display case where we looked through its
pages while he explained the origin and significance of the text.
Upon leaving Timbuktu a few days later – after fulfilling that childhood
desire to ride a camel and camp in the Sahara desert – I began processing my
experience at the Mamma Haïdara Library. I found the institution increasingly
perplexing. It seemed to have all the hallmarks of international investment yet the
material of the library was treated in a very casual manner. I found it difficult to
balance the potential value the manuscripts may yield to scholarship with the
internationally funded institutional practice of swooping in, building tangible
monuments to donors’ generosity and skipping town – a tactic foreign aid and
development organizations have mastered.
An Andrew Mellon Foundation Grant obtained by a team of conservators,
researchers, scholars, and UNESCO members from France, USA, Germany and
Norway funded the construction of the Mamma Haïdara Library. Together with
members of the Malian government the library structure was completed. I have no
doubt that the intentions of the international team were ultimately benevolent and
the construction of the library was to ensure the preservation and access to the
manuscripts. My worry lies in the sustainability of the project and the effect it may
have on the community.
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Without straying too far into a critique of the Development and International
Aid Industry, I would like to illustrate some potential problems that may arise from
the movement of Islamic manuscripts to an internationally funded institutional
space. There are two main issues that have the potential of being problematic. The
first involves access.
The newly constructed libraries of Timbuktu are built, as previously stated,
to store the manuscripts in a space that ensures their preservation in the years to
come. This motive alone could be critiqued; however, the greater problem is the
potential of this action to exclude local scholars from accessing the manuscripts.
The library may use a sliding scale when it comes to admission prices for research of
the manuscripts, but the audience the new libraries are favoring seems to be foreign
one. This is an institution constructed by foreign scholars for foreign scholars.
While this is an improvement over the colonial practice of removing cultural
artifacts from occupied regions, it is still a display of power and wealth that removes
the manuscripts from their previous associations (with the descendents of the
historian who started the collection) and places them in a sterile, secure, new
environment that greater resembles Western methods of organization than Malian.
The second issue is also related to access but comments more on the state of
the Malian economy and its reliance on foreign aid. The creation of any foreign
funded institution in Mali is an opportunity for the local and surrounding population
to gain employment. Outside of running a small store or vending table at the
market, most Malians function as subsistence farmers or herders. In an economy
that offers very little employment, yet provides means for education, jobs with
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foreign institutions are coveted and aggressively pursued. Even landing a job as a
guard at an NGO compound increases the status and lifestyle of an individual. These
opportunities have become intertwined with the economy of villages, towns, regions
and the nation. While this may seem to be advantageous to the people, it is in fact a
terrible consolation. Outside aid accounts for a large percentage of Mali’s GNP and
reveals the truth about the Aid Industry: in short, it isn’t working. Malians are
obliged to compete for these positions while the foreign industry built around
“benevolence” grows. Federal programs in Mali, because of the government’s
saturation of foreign money, do little to create new jobs. The country functions with
a crutch when the goal of aid organizations should be just that: aid, not means.
This ties into the problem at large in Mali and across the African continent.
Outside, foreign funded programs with little or no inclusion of Malians in their
process – including financial responsibility from Malians – devalue the very project
that was initially created to help. I am not arguing that this happens across the
board but it is common, and I speak from experience. The creation of the Islamic
manuscript libraries could ultimately devaluate the artifacts, from religious and
cultural signifiers to commodities. Once the libraries and manuscripts are viewed
only in their relation to the tourist industry their cultural value to the people of
Timbuktu could diminish greatly. In turn, this could lead to a relationship based on
exchange value rather than cultural and spiritual value. The preservation of
commodities and the preservation of artifacts that represent historical, religious
and symbolic value are two very divergent practices.
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Of course, there is no easy solution to the proposed paradigm. For the
Malians of Timbuktu to remain isolationist and protective of the manuscripts is
neither realistic nor possible in the contemporary, globally connected world. One
method would be to weigh the pros and cons regarding the space and function of the
new institutionalized Mamma Haidara Library:
The accessibility to the Islamic manuscripts by scholars from around the
world provides a greater understanding of the history of Islam and the
history of the region – versus – the possible exclusion of local scholars and
faithful Muslims by the institutional environment and the
commodification of their culture and history.
The increased tourism the impoverished region generates from visiting
scholars and curious tourists will improve the local economy – versus –
increased tourism’s potential to exacerbate the commodification of culture
and history leading to the devaluation of culture into monetary
expression.
Deciphering benefit from detriment in a case like this also depends on the
method by which one decides which artifacts are valuable to a specific people and
which are not: Who gets to make this decision? Often this decision is taken out of
the hands of those experiencing the hardship and into the hands of an influential
post-colonial presence that justify their actions under the guise of benevolence.
This leads to an ultimately greater dilemma: the continued subjugation of history
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and culture belonging to those deemed unfit or unable to preserve, advance or help
themselves. This is unfortunately a widespread, underlying, often knee-jerk
perspective of Africans in general, and one that has been imposed on them for so
long that they have started to believe it as truth.
*
*
*
This essay is obviously an experientially based critique. It encapsulates
many of my experiences and situates them in context with the phenomenon of the
Islamic manuscript libraries of Timbuktu. Issues of identity, the Other, the
International Aid Development Complex, neo-colonial imperialism, scholarship,
African anthropology, and cultural tourism are all at play here. These are issues too
complex and important to summarize, but I hope it brings a fresh perspective to a
discourse that seems increasingly didactic at best, and hopeless at worst.
I would like to cite Ann Stoler’s article Colonial Archives and the Arts of
Governance4, for helping me process the idea of the colonial archive and its influence
on post-colonial models. When assessing the anthropological integrity of utilizing
the archive, Stoler emphasizes that particular attention needs to be paid to the
process and function of the archive, in addition to the artifacts present in their
collections. This is fundamental to the critique of post-colonial archives (and
archives in general) and this insight opened areas of critique that I applied to the
perspective shared in this essay.
Stoler, Ann. Colonial Archives and the Arts of Governance. Archival Science, 2: 87109, 2002.
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Appendix:
Photographs of Tombouctou [Timbuktu]
by Christopher Bentley
Looking south from the north bank of
the Niger upon arrival in Timbuktu
The market
A central mosque of Timbuktu – note the pyramid style, scaffold
and mud (adobe) architecture unique to this region of Mali and
the Moroccan style door with silver inlays.
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The Mamma Haïdara
Commemorative Library in
Timbuktu: Storage and display
cabinets housing the manuscripts
with glass and wood doors and
protective cardboard exteriors for
the artifacts.
An Islamic manuscript displayed by the librarian. The handling of manuscripts
is a practice fundamentally removed from Western archival methods but
essential to the Muslim community’s relationship to the manuscripts.
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Islamic manuscripts on display at the Mamma Haïdara Library:
Above, a 16th century manuscript and below, manuscripts with
text and images relating to astronomy. These photos were
taken through the glass of the center display table at the
library.
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Above, the librarian returning manuscript to the exterior
cardboard case. And finally, below is a photo of my boyhood
dream coming true: a camel caravan trip into the Sahara.
Touristy? Definitely. Regretted? Absolutely not.
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